Ethereal Warrior

…stillness within the chaos

Simply put: Buddhism puts science experiments in our hands, or rather, in our minds. “You’re not just reading about what other scientists have done and, you know, confirmed and so forth like that, but you, yourself, are the experimenter. You experiment with your own mind,” said Kadam Morten Clausen, Resident Teacher at the Kadampa Meditation Center.

This experimentation allows us to discover the depths of our peace, love and kindness and a spiritual dimension that is empirically verifiable.

Learning mindfulness and meditation techniques can help us minimize stressful mind-wandering and cultivate emotional wellness and happiness. In the coming years further studies of how adult brains are able to change will help us better understand whats involved in emotional well being and promote better mental health for everyone.

How do you convince yourself to go on?Youre cold and wet and youve been crawling on the sand for hours with your heavy pack biting into your shoulders and your knees are bloody and your shoulders want to collapse, and you dont know when this will end. Your mind has been complaining constantly, Why are we doing this? Whats the worst that would happen if we just quit and walked away? What are we trying to prove? Is it worth it? You could go home and sleep. Wouldnt that be nice?And its incredibly tempting to give in to your mind, because it is very convincing. We are very very good at rationalizing, especially in the face of pain. Its painful, and you want the pain to end, and you want to just rest. This is what happens when it starts to suck. And that was just the beginning of the suck there were many other such moments along the way.I would convince myself to go on first by being aware of what my mind was doing. I would watch my mind as an outside observer, and laugh at my mind and its rationalizations. Then I would pay attention to the ground in front of my face, the waves on the beach washing up near my body, the incredible view of the Golden Gate Bridge lit up at night, and think, I am incredibly lucky. I would feel the pain and the tiredness, and think, What a wonderful thing it is to feel. And then I would say, Just one more step. We can re-evaluate after one more step. Then Id repeat that after that one step. It also helped that I had a team relying on me, and that I couldnt just quit or Id let them down.

A balanced life is necessary for personal effectiveness, mental peace and living well. We all have responsibilities; whether we are working, going to school, or retired. And while dealing with those responsibilities, we will face many troubles and possibly get frustrated. So to get rid of that frustration and stressful energy we must do proactive things to keep us in balance.To achieve a continually balance state is not an easy task but its also not an impossible one.If your determination is strong and you commit to regular practice you will find greater enjoyment in everything you do.

The value of venting is a myth. The theory on which the idea of venting anger is based has been repeatedly disproven since the 1950s.While it may feel cathartic, venting anger doesn’t purge aggression from your system or improve psychological state. In fact, it’s more likely to increase anger and aggressiveness. Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, cautions that venting feels satisfying “because of the seductive nature of anger.”

Everyone has an inner lizard, that part of your brain tasked with alerting you to threats in your environment and keeping you safe. Your inner lizards an important critter, but sometimes hes over-involved. In conflict, you want to manage your inner lizard instead of allowing him to manage you.Your inner lizard lives in the reptilian part of your brain called the amygdala, which is like an emotional tripwire and primes you for impulsive reaction, such as fleeing from danger or staying to fight off a threat. In emotional emergencies, such as in conflict conversations, your rational mind can get swamped by your emotional one. I think of it this way: The inner lizard wakes up, takes note of the threat, and jumps valiantly into action.